Today, you’re going to see the spirits of the dead run a lemonade stand. TGIF!

Okay, so it isn’t a lemonade stand. It’s a snow cone stand.

The Icebusters Sno-Cone Machine, made by Lanard in 1985, was an incredibly strange attempt to steal shine from the Ghostbusters craze.

I’m not being a brat, right? This thing had to be inspired by Ghostbusters. Why else would they call it Icebusters? I understand that a snow cone maker technically does bust ice, but you really wouldn’t put it that way that unless you were trying to be Egon.

So we can agree that Ghostbusters was to blame. That’s freakin’ freaky. Some guy made the inconceivable mental leap from Ghostbusters to snow cones. I can only envision the steps between Point A and Z as a sea of disembodied animal heads, floating against a wall of wild, swirling colors. The existence of this machine was a complete slap in the face to 1985’s still-running “Just Say No” campaign, because damn, if drugs were gonna lead us from Ghostbusters to snow cones, inject me now and give me a lot. Read More…

It’s funny. I’ve been doing the Countdown forever, and in years past, Dollar Tree was always my final resort. A last ditch effort to catch the Halloween spirit by way of frivolous spending, after every other store in a twenty mile radius let me down.

Well, no more. I don’t know what lit a fire under their ass, or asses, or maybe collective ass, but for the past few Halloween seasons, Dollar Tree has been killing it. So much good stuff!

The things I found today were wonderful with no asterisks. Not just wonderful in an “it’s only a dollar” sort of way. I think the fruits of my five dollar shopping spree (six if you count the background tablecloth) will prove it. Read More…

Somebody has to. They’re great. I own well over a hundred scary movie DVDs, and since I have the tendency to buy copies of films I’ve already seen ten thousand times, the real thrill, and frequently, the only thrill, is seeing how the production team summed everything up on those often cheesy, always awesome menus.

I plucked ten horror DVDs from my collection at random. Below are my thoughts on their menu screens.

Hellraiser III: Dig it. With the chunky text and crude blood, it looks like a game from the original Mortal Kombat era. I thought Pinhead had black eyes, but even if this was editorialized, those red eyes work. Really brings the whole color scheme together. Read More…

After this post, I promise not to make weird things out of Halloween food for at least a few days. I know I’ve been doing it too much. It’s not like such features are turning me into an Internet superstar, so I must assume that there’s some deeply buried psychological need at play.

The first step is admission. The second step is to write about something else. As of this moment, I’m only ready to take the first step. So, here’s a really gross thing I made from brownies, pumpkin marshmallows and green-dyed coconut shavings.

Say hi to Bowl. Bowl plays host to brownie mix, oil, water, an egg and a bunch of crushed Halloween Oreos. Looked at from just the right angle, Bowl is an organic Death Star. The very definition of a “happy accident.” Read More…

I’m currently working on a big ass feature. It has the potential to be great, but it also has the potential to be terrible, so I’m gonna need some time to wrap that baby up. With panic setting in over the thought of a Monday with no new content, I dived into my stock of goodies and yanked out, uh, candy slime.

I don’t know if they’re new, and I even have a sneaking suspicion that I’ve reviewed them before. Googling around the old site brings up nothing, so I will assume I’m in the clear.

New or not, Hubba Bubba’s Halloween Squeeze Pops are some of the best candies available this season, wrapping everything we love about Halloween up in a couple of extremely strange packages.

Never had a Squeeze Pop? They’re filled with what’s best described as “candy gel.” Not quite liquid, not quite solid. The goo is messy, and eating more than a drop of it will make your stomach perform the Caribbean beguine, but Halloween is the exact right time for this kind of grossness.

On the left is cherry Vampire’s Blood, fronted by a yellow-eyed vampire who totally stole my trademarked placement of mouth blood.

The only weird thing is his pendant. It isn’t the typical evil cross, or even a bat. It’s just some big, purple dot. I can understand why Hubba Bubba wanted to avoid any religious connections, but still, a purple dot? It looks like he’s wearing a giant grape. That doesn’t work with a cherry Squeeze Pop.

On the right, Mummy Slime. Even if I’m loyal to blood and even more loyal to cherries, I have to admit, this is the more creative of the two Squeeze Pops. With a goofy, slime-drenched mummy as its mascot, the sour apple sludge is 120 grams’ worth of good good good. Read More…